2 Women Are Tied to Deaths of Homeless Men

Published: May 24, 2006

The ties between two women and a homeless man killed in a hit-and-run accident were strong enough to raise police suspicions five years ago, but it took a second death with eerie similarities for the police to make arrests.

The women, Helen Golay, 75, and Olga Rutterschmidt, 73, were charged last week with eight counts of federal mail fraud for collecting more than $2 million from policies they held on the two homeless men, Paul Vados and Kenneth McDavid.

In early 2000, a Hollywood homicide detective flew to Northern California to interview relatives of Mr. Vados, whose body was found in a Hollywood alley in 1999, and to show them photographs of Ms. Golay and Ms. Rutterschmidt, the police said.

''If they came all the way up to Northern California, they were definitely serious about it,'' said Randy Hansen, a longtime boyfriend of Mr. Vados's daughter, Stella Vados. ''But they didn't have enough stuff.''

Despite their suspicions, investigators were unable to find enough evidence to charge the women until Thursday, Lt. Paul Vernon of the Los Angeles Police Department said. The police said they were still trying determine whether Ms. Golay and Ms. Rutterschmidt had been directly involved in the deaths or in other unresolved accidents.

Mr. Hansen said he told the detectives in 2000 that he did not know the women, even though, according to an F.B.I. affidavit, they had said they were Mr. Vados's only living relatives when they claimed his body from the coroner's office.

Mr. Hansen, who owns a thrift store in Grass Valley, in the Sierra Nevada foothills, said the police had told him they suspected that Mr. Vados's Social Security checks had been sent to a home in Santa Monica owned by Ms. Golay for at least three years.

After learning that Ms. Golay and Ms. Rutterschmidt had claimed Mr. Vados's body and had it buried without a headstone, Mr. Hansen said, he and Stella Vados negotiated with the women to have the body moved to a family plot.

Mr. Hansen said Los Angeles detectives also traveled to Washington State in 2000 to interview Mr. Vados's son, Paul Vados Jr., who was incarcerated there at the time.

Mr. Hansen said he was contacted by detectives again eight months ago and was told they were investigating Ms. Golay and Ms. Rutterschmidt in connection with Mr. McDavid's death. He was found dead in an alley off Westwood Boulevard here in June 2005. Each death occurred shortly after a two-year waiting period had expired for the women to collect on the policies.

The women have been jailed pending a June 5 arraignment. Ms. Golay's daughter, Kecia Golay, has said her mother was not a part of any scheme.